Hawk & Arrow
by agentsofpuppies
Summary: Natasha, looking to do something drastic and get over her ex, wanders into Clint's tattoo shop. The AU you didn't know you needed.
1. Chapter 1

Started as a Tumblr prompt and now it looks like it'll have a few chapters so here it is...the tattoo parlor AU.

* * *

Natasha scowled down at the phone screen, the message that was the final nail in the coffin.

 _I'll be in Miami this weekend. You can box up your stuff._

She slammed the phone atop the stack of loan applications she was supposed to be sorting through. She had a savage impulse to deny them all.

Logan's words played through her head.

 _I need to know you're all in. I can't be with someone who isn't sure what they want._

She knew what she wanted now, all right. His dick in a panini press.

 _I think it makes more sense to focus on my career. Why don't you leave the bank? Open that cute little ballet studio you keep talking about?_

Maybe she _liked_ her career.

 _You're afraid of commitment, Natasha._

They'd only been dating eighteen months. Who bought a ring after eighteen months? What kind of asshole gave ultimatums?

She was well past the crying and watching Bridget Jones on loop. She could do better than Logan. Her focus drifted, she tapped her pen against the corner of her desk, casting her mind around for the perfect fuck-you gesture.

A slow smile stretched her lips. She'd show him commitment.

She closed her inbox, ignoring the thirty or so emails demanding her attention, and brought up Google instead. She spent the rest of the morning doing research, important research, until at last she was satisfied. She had found the most raved about tattoo studio in the city.

 _Ask for Clint_ , the reviews read.

 _Best shop in Manhattan._

 _Give that man his own reality show._

 _Clean. Professional._

 _Clint made my prison ink look like art._

 _10/10 would bang._

It sounded promising enough, and it was in walking distance, so she shot a quick email to Darcy telling her to reschedule the lunch conference and begged off the afternoon's team building seminar.

The tattoo studio, Hawk and Arrow, didn't have much of an online presence. She found a bare bones website with a few photos of the artists' work, and a contact us page that declared Clint Barton CEO/Head Artist/Coffee Manager.

No picture, though, and she was a little disappointed after someone had declared _10/10 would bang_.

On a whim, she pulled up the bank's database and searched for Clint Barton. She got a hit, a small business loan set up to draft payments from a checking account on the first of each month. It seemed a little rude (and borderline unethical) to pry into his account balance without cause, but as manager of First American Bank's loan division, she felt well within her rights to take a quick peek at his payment history.

Spotty at best, and that was being generous. The collections staff could probably tell her more about him than Google.

Still, it took years to make an independent business profitable, so she decided to let his delinquency slide and give the studio a shot.

She gathered her bag and phone and slipped quietly from her office to the elevator banks. She had lied to Darcy, cancelled the lunch conference to work on a fictional emergency mortgage loan refinancing case. She had maybe an hour before anyone missed her.

She made it out of the building and into the crush of pedestrians without being caught, and made her way down the few blocks to the tattoo studio.

It was a small red brick building, wedged between a boutique and a dog bakery, with Hawk and Arrow splashed across the front window in purple graffiti-style letters. She hesitated, suddenly struck with doubt, but having a look inside couldn't hurt.

She pushed the door open; a soft mechanical tone announced her presence to an empty waiting area.

The interior was more coffee shop than tattoo studio. A polished wood counter ran the length of the wall across from the front window, with a stack of binders piled at the corner. A door behind the counter, currently closed, led to the rest of the building. There were two leather couches and a low table in front of each, magazines and newspapers stacked neatly. One of the couches held a big golden dog, who thumped his tail once against the pillows, then hopped down and trotted over to greet her.

"Lucky, huh?" she asked the dog, kneeling down to read his collar and ruffle the soft fur around his ears. The dog smiled at her and flopped over, exposing his belly.

"Hi."

She startled and turned to the counter.

A man leaned causally there, one elbow resting against the shiny wood. He had kind grey eyes and messy hair. He wore boots and tailored jeans and a blue button down shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbow. The cotton strained against his biceps and chest as he shifted positions and crossed his arms.

Would bang, indeed.

"I'm looking for Clint," she said, although she was pretty sure she'd found him. She stood gracefully in her three inch heels. Lucky whined in protest.

The man watched her with a new wariness behind his eyes.

"Am I being served?" he asked suspiciously.

That was an odd thing to ask a stranger.

"Are you expecting to be?" she countered.

"Is that a yes or a no?"

"No."

"In that case, Clint Barton," he said with a grin, and stuck out his hand for her to shake.

She accepted and returned his smile.

"So, how can I- _oh shit_."

He jerked his hand free of her grasp and took a step back. His eyes dropped to fix firmly on her breasts. She followed his gaze, a scowl tugging her lips down, until she noticed she was still wearing the silver name tag with her title and the bank's logo.

"That's not why I'm here, either," she told him sardonically, and shoved the name tag in her pocket. He gave a wild, desperate little chuckle and scrubbed a hand through the already messy hair at the nape of his neck.

"It's been a really shit week," he offered in explanation. He stepped forward and gave Lucky a scratch behind the ears. "Why don't you tell me why you're here, 'stead of me guessing?"

"I want a tattoo," she told him slowly, as if he were very stupid. How did this place have such rave reviews? He pulled a skeptical expression.

"Can I ask _why_?"

"Clint?" A young woman stuck her head around the door to the back. "Do you know where the...oh." Her face fell as she caught sight of Natasha. "Are we being audited again?"

"She's a customer, Kate," Clint sighed, and shook his head. "I'll be back there in a minute."

Audited _again_? Natasha bit her lip to hide a smile. Kate shrugged and disappeared into the back room.

" _Really_ shit week," Clint reiterated.

She should probably be concerned about his ability to keep up his loan payments, if he expected to be served with court papers and audited and was afraid of a visit from the bank, but she only felt a little sorry for him. Maybe it was the dog. Or the biceps.

"So?" he prompted, and she remembered that he had asked her a question. She wasn't prepared to put her reasoning into words, and she cast her eyes around the waiting area as she searched for an answer that wouldn't make her sound completely vindictive and desperate.

"Just wanted to make a change," she said at last. "Do something exciting."

Clint arched an eyebrow.

"Tattoos are a big commitment-"

"I'm not afraid of commitment," she snapped, then winced a little at her tone. Clint raised his hands in surrender.

"Okay, jeez. Did you have something in mind?"

Wasn't that his job, to suggest things? Shouldn't he _know_ , somehow?

"Er...no," she admitted. Clint frowned.

"Budget?" he asked.

"The money doesn't matter," she said with a shrug. She pulled her phone from her pocket and tapped the screen. "I've got thirty-five minutes. What can you do with that much time?"

"Okay," he said with a slow, sly smile. "I know what this is. You got dumped."

"That's none of your busin-"

"Look, honey," he interrupted. He slung an arm around her shoulder and walked them toward the door. "Natasha. You don't want a tattoo. You want to call up some girlfriends, go down to Riley's and have a few drinks, spend a couple hours flirting."

"That's _not_ what I want," she snarled, incensed by his audacity. She pushed his arm away. "Are you going to do the tattoo or not?"

"No," he said simply.

 _No?!_ What an asshole.

She pulled the name tag from her pocket and pinned it back to her shirt.

"I don't think you're in a position to be turning down business, Mr. Barton."

"Listen, lady," he began heatedly, squaring his shoulders.

Her phone buzzed in her hand, Logan's name and number displayed across the top of the screen. The details of the breakup came back to her, and despite the I'm-better-off-without-him front she'd been putting on, the memories still stung. Her inclination to argue with Clint Barton seeped away all at once.

"Just forget it," she muttered. She brushed past him and made her exit.

What a stupid, childish idea. At least her schedule was clear, so she could spend the rest of the afternoon sulking in her office.

"Hey, wait a minute!"

She spun to find Clint jogging to catch up to her, Lucky prancing along behind him. He drew even and laid a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Let's compromise. What about a piercing instead? That way if you have second thoughts, you can take it out and pretend the whole thing never happened."

She wrinkled her nose - piercings weren't really her thing - but she supposed she could have Clint put a needle through her bellybutton and get a crop top to wear the next time she saw Logan. It would probably piss him off just as much as a tattoo. And Clint had a point, she could always take it out later.

"Sure, okay," she agreed. They began walking back to the tattoo shop.

"And when I'm done," Clint continued, "you can call up your girlfriends and tell them to meet you at Riley's later. Like around eight. And I might run into you. If that's something you wouldn't mind?"

He held open the door for her and gave her a devastating grin that was probably his go-to for getting in a girl's pants.

"Don't push it," she warned him, but she said it with a smile. Maybe she would set something up after all. And if Clint Barton showed up with his biceps and goofy smile, well, 10/10 would bang.


	2. Chapter 2

More of the AU you didn't know you needed! Enjoy!

* * *

Natasha came up the back stairwell and slunk quietly past the I.T. department cubicles. Most everyone on their floor was in the kitchen or breakroom for lunch, so there was nobody to catch her as she pushed into her office and dropped her bag in the chair by the door.

"Mortgage refinancing, huh?" Darcy asked. The leather executive chair behind her desk spun slowly to reveal Natasha's second in command. Darcy sat with her elbows perched on the armrests and her fingers steepled, looking every bit the evil villain, a sly little grin tugging her lips.

"Mortgage refinancing," Natasha agreed. She held the door open. "Can't you go be creepy in your own office?"

"Nah, there's a guy in my office," Darcy said with a shrug. She vacated Natasha's chair and slid up to sit on the desk instead. "He wants an extension or something. I'm letting him stew. So where were you?"

"Lunch," she lied. Maybe if she pretended to work, Darcy would stop prying. She reclaimed her chair, opened her email, and scowled at the thirty-seven new messages.

"Your lunch is in the fridge," Darcy countered. " _Was_ in the fridge. The salad was good, did you make the dressing? It was in a little container instead of a bottle."

"I went out for lunch," Natasha insisted. "Because you ate mine."

"You didn't know I was going to eat your lunch when you left. Were you meeting a guy? You were meeting a rebound guy, weren't you?"

"Fine, yes," Natasha agreed, seizing her out. "I met a guy for lunch."

Admitting to a fictional rebound was somehow less mortifying than coming clean about the vindictive navel piercing. And, Natasha reasoned, the rebound might not be so fictional after all, if she kept recalling the soft pressure of Clint's hands on her bare stomach. She squirmed at the memory and chewed her lip as Darcy crowed a triumphant ' _I knew it_!'

She scowled at her email while Darcy's gloating ran its course. She blew out a sigh, steeling herself for round two.

"We should go out tonight," she suggested.

As expected, Darcy gave another gleeful " _Ha!_ " of laughter.

"So you can see Rebound Guy again, right?"

"Do you want to go or not?" Natasha demanded.

"Oh, I'm free for this," Darcy assured her. "Grind?"

Natasha shook her head. Clint didn't strike her as the club type, and he certainly didn't seem the type to sit in Tony Stark's VIP lounge and sip cocktails.

"Riley's," she said, repeating the name Clint had mentioned.

"The dive bar?" Darcy asked, and wrinkled her nose in distaste. "There's not even dancing. What are we supposed to do?"

"Drink and flirt?" Natasha suggested.

"Okay," Darcy agreed dubiously, "but if it's lame we're taking a cab to Grind. I'll call Jane."

"I'll get Maria and Sharon and Pepper. She'll probably bring Tony."

"I'll tell Jane to bring her intern. He's a good time."

"Eight o'clock," Natasha said. Darcy slid off her desk and headed for the door. "And don't call him Rebound Guy. His name's Clint."

Darcy snorted and disappeared into the corridor, and Natasha resigned herself to explaining the new nickname to Clint later. Still not as awkward as Darcy finding out about the vindictive navel piercing.

Maria, Sharon, and Pepper all accepted the invitation to meet at the bar, Pepper agreeing to bring Tony along so Clint wouldn't be the only guy. That was the easy calls done. Natasha tapped a business card against the corner of her desk, unlocked her phone twice without dialing the number printed on the card, shoved both items back into her purse and drew them out again.

Clint had said ' _I might run into you_ '. _Might_. Was she expected to extend a formal invitation, or would he show up of his own accord either way?

She dialed the number on the card, hoping she wasn't about to make an idiot of herself.

"Hawk and Arrow?"

It was Kate who answered, not Clint, and she felt a momentary sweeping relief until she realized she'd have to ask for him.

"Is Clint there?"

"Busy," Kate replied, the word clipped and sharp. Natasha remembered Clint's fear of being served court papers, the way Kate expected the business to be audited. She should have asked for his cell number before she left.

"Can you give him a message?"

"Depends on the message."

"Just tell him 'Riley's at eight'. He'll understand."

She hung up before Kate could question her further, and immediately felt childish and stupid. But what else was there to say after the time and place of the impromptu party? What if Kate had decided to get Clint after all, and she actually had to speak to him?

Natasha let her phone sit on her desk the rest of the afternoon, in case Clint got her number from the shop's caller i.d. and tried to call her back or send a text, but the screen stayed blank. She slipped out an hour early, down the back stairwell and around the edge of the atrium, keeping her head down as she passed the security guard at the front desk.

Her apartment (small and overpriced, but with a view of Central Park) was approximately a forty minute walk away, depending on traffic and crossing signals. She swung by her favorite boutique and picked a new dress for the night, pushing the trek home to a full hour. That left two to get ready.

She showered and texted Pepper a picture of her new dress, spent entirely too much time curling her hair and winging her eyeliner and deliberating over shoes and purses. Clint still hadn't made contact by seven, when she stood in front of the full length mirror and twirled for her empty bedroom.

The dress was perfect, just the right balance between dive bar and club, a deep burgundy color with ruching and a plunging neckline, although not plunging enough to give the impression she was looking for a rebound. Which she absolutely wasn't. Despite the way she kept remembering Clint's hands on her.

The dress was too much. She stripped it off and began tearing clothes out of her closet.

When she stepped out of the cab forty-five minutes later, it was in skinny jeans and heeled boots and a sleeveless print top that definitely didn't suggest anything more than a friendly date.

She walked a short distance and knocked on the window of a white limousine parked at the curb.

"Pep said it's your fault we're not at the club," Tony accused as the window slid down. "Do they even have VIP here?"

"Get out of the car, Tony," she suggested sweetly. Tony scowled but put the window back up, and obligingly stepped out to stand beside her on the sidewalk, followed by Pepper. Another cab pulled up with Darcy, Jane, and a tall, awkward guy she took for Jane's intern. Then Sharon and surprisingly Steve (in full military uniform) crossed the intersection, and Maria pulled up and left her black Charger double parked in front of a fire hydrant.

Everyone started talking at once, and Natasha was content to link arms with Pepper and let the chatter wash over her as Tony led the way inside.

"This is Ian, he's shy so he probably won't talk, but he's got a nice ass-"

"Two weeks leave, starting yesterday-"

"They won't tow it, it's government property-"

"What happened to the dress?"

The bar was empty save for them and a grizzled man in leather bent over his shot glass on a barstool. Tony swept his eyes over the bar, then clapped his hands.

"Party of ten, if Nat's rebound shows. Steve-o?"

"He's not a rebound!" she protested, but Tony and Steve had already broken away from the group to shove tables together, and everyone else gave her varying degrees of eye rolls and skeptical expressions.

Clint was officially Rebound Guy, then.

"No moving the tables," the barkeeper announced, a hint of incredulity and impatience behind his tone, and indicated a handwritten sign over the bar declaring just that. Tony shrugged, slapped a fifty on the bar, and went back to helping Steve. The barkeeper slid the bribe into his back pocket, and the patron at the end of the bar downed his shot and stalked out.

"Tab's on me tonight," Tony announced next, and laid his black AmEx on the bar. "Ladies, drinks?"

Natasha shot Pepper a significant look. The grandstanding was Tony's way of coping with unfamiliar places and situations, but it would scare Clint off. Clint, with the endearing grin and gentle hands and his ever-present fear of having his little tattoo parlor taken away.

"I'll talk to him," Pepper mouthed softly back, at the same time Maria called "Martini, two olives!"

"No olives," the barkeeper told them, and he watched them with a bemused expression. "No martinis, either."

The menu, it turned out, was limited to beer, alcohol mixed with soda, or alcohol mixed with more alcohol. Nothing shaken, no garnishes, and nothing with 'pomegranate' in the name.

Tony modified the usual drink orders while Natasha dragged Steve to the jukebox in the back corner. They fed the machine quarters and managed to line up ten songs that weren't some variation of country music.

"Who's going first?" Sharon asked as they claimed their seats at the table. Pepper passed her a glass of dark soda and something that tasted a bit like whiskey, while Sharon slid two beers down the table to Steve.

"I broke up with Logan," Natasha offered.

A chorus of ' _We know_ 's.

"I shot a guy yesterday," from Maria and Sharon simultaneously.

"Terrifying," Tony assessed. "Jane? Wow me."

"Scientists at CERN discovered-"

"No shop talk!" Steve and Pepper reminded them.

"Darcy?" Natasha prompted, but Darcy had her face suctioned to Ian the intern's. Natasha flicked one of Steve's bottle caps at them.

"What?" Darcy demanded. "You said we were coming here to flirt. Drink and flirt. Verbatim."

"Okay, this is way better than the scary loan officer thing." Natasha spun in her chair to find Clint standing behind her, arms crossed and wearing an incredibly amused expression. "Drink and flirt, that's the agenda?"

"Weren't those your instructions?" she countered, and arched a brow. Clint shrugged, conceding her point, then laid a warm hand on her shoulder and bent to brush his lips against her cheek in a chaste greeting.

He pulled back with a grin, and she doggedly ignored the swoop of nervous butterflies in her stomach.

"This is Clint," she told the table at large, very pointedly. _Do not call him Rebound Guy or I will end you_ went unspoken. Steve scooted and Clint swung a chair in beside her while everyone introduced themselves. Pepper gave her a not-so-subtle thumbs up.

They asked politely about the tattoo parlor, Clint accepted Tony's offer to put his beers on the group's tab, and another drink and an hour later Natasha stopped worrying about Clint skipping out prematurely.

"You play?" Clint asked, and nodded at the pair of pool tables in the back.

"I'm not very good," she lied.

Clint was starting to be a real contender for the Rebound Guy title, and as much as she hated to admit it, she was beginning to wonder if he was as skilled in other areas as he was at flirting. A small part of her, the part that wanted to send Logan a resounding 'fucky you', wanted to find out.

It was counter to most of her principles, but half an hour of letting him think she sucked at pool would be worth it. He'd probably do the old teach-the-girl-to-shoot cliche, her back pressed against his chest and his arms around her, and she knew how to make purposeful ass-on-crotch grinding look like an accident and draw him in.

"Don't think I'll go easy on you," he warned with a smile, and there was a new spark of mischief behind his eyes as he took her hand and led her to the back of the bar.

She didn't get a chance to feign incompetence. Clint racked the balls, took the first shot, then sunk all the solids and the eight ball consecutively. He went after the stripes and put those in the pockets too, just to show off.

He stepped back, smirked, studied her for a reaction.

Asshole.

"My turn," she told him, meeting his gaze head on, all thoughts of crotch grinding long since pushed away. She only wanted to beat him at his own game now, teach him a lesson for giving her some kind of nonsensical date suitability test. He was obviously weighing her reaction.

He obligingly racked the balls and passed her the cue.

She made a show of checking her grip on the stick, biting her lip, giving several false starts before breaking with enough force that the sound echoed around the bar. Clint's eyes went a little wide and she gave him a smug grin. She repeated his pattern - solids, eight ball, stripes - then pushed the cue back into his hands.

"Son of a bitch," he muttered appreciatively, and she could feel his eyes on her as she swept back to join the group.

Clint came back with another round of drinks, a new tension to his shoulders and hesitancy in the way he took his seat beside her. She smiled and accepted the glass, taking care to brush her fingers briefly against his, _no hard feelings_. She wasn't quite sure what to do with a man who didn't try to coddle her, but it felt new and different and she liked it.

The bar became crowded and their group got separated. She found herself in a booth near the back, sitting next to Clint instead of across from him, leaning in close to listen as he told her about Kate and Lucky and bragged about how he could shoot arrows blindfolded standing on horseback.

Somehow her thigh was pressed against his, and somehow his hand found hers under the table, and he kissed her and she grew suddenly fond of the boring little dive bar.

"Romanoff, Barton! Round two, we're going to Grind!"

She swore at Tony under her breath as Clint broke away, but the club would be darker than the bar and that probably meant more kissing. She dragged Clint from the booth with a smile and made to join Tony and Pepper, but he gave her wrist a tug to hold her back.

"Natasha," he said softly, and nodded to the pool table at the back. "Can I have a minute?"

She followed him back, and waited expectantly while he shuffled his weight to first his left foot then the right, and scrubbed a hand through his hair.

"Look, I think I'm gonna sit this one out."

"That's...oh."

She'd meant to say 'okay', play it off, but the last syllable got lost somewhere in her disappointment.

"It's not...I'm having a great time, it's..." He blew out a sigh. "Okay, you've got Tony Stark, an astrophysicist, a junior astrophysicist, two bank execs, a war hero, a CIA agent, the CFO of Stark Industries, Maria just said ' _classified_ ' when I asked her what she does so she's probably an international superspy or something, and then there's me, the tattoo guy. One of these things doesn't belong, sweetheart."

"Did someone say something?" she asked, and oh, she would murder them.

Clint gave her a sad little smile.

"No, your friends are nice. I just know when I'm out of my league."

"We could stay here," she suggested, and hoped Clint was being genuine with his insecurities instead of looking for a polite way out. His eyebrows shot up.

"You want to stay _here_?"

"I could kick your ass at pool again. That was fun."

More kissing would be fun, too. More... _more_. She wished she'd worn the dress after all.

"You sure?"

"I'm telling them to go without us," Natasha said, and shot Pepper a quick text. Pepper gave her a slow, knowing grin from across the bar, waved, and disappeared outside after the rest of the group.

Her phone bleeped a text.

 _Get it Romanoff_ , six eggplant emojis.

Clint snorted a laugh beside her.

"Something you want to tell me?" he asked.

"Darcy sort of thinks you're a rebound," Natasha admitted, and felt her cheeks heat up. She shoved the phone back into her pocket.

"Am I?"

"No," she said a little too quickly. "I let her think I met a guy for lunch, instead of telling her about the piercing."

"Why?"

"It was a stupid thing to do, in retrospect. I didn't want her to know I was that desperate to get back at Logan."

Clint chuckled again.

"God, what if I'd inked a big butterfly across your tits?"

"Shut up," she said, but there was laughter behind her words, too. She thumped him on the arm. "You were right, okay? I would've regretted it."

Clint rolled his eyes, but saved the I-told-you-so.

"Can I buy you a drink for real?" he asked. The faint undercurrent of disdain behind the words didn't slip her notice. For all his polite banter, Clint wasn't a fan of Tony and his tab.

"Depends. Are we making this a for-real date?"

"It's real," he assured her, and threw her a wink and a smirk before heading to the bar.


	3. Chapter 3

"Where's home?" Clint asked.

His hand was warm through her shirt, fingers splayed against the small of her back as he steered her outside. She imagined his hand sliding lower, grinned, bit her lip to hide it.

It took her a moment to orient herself, the street unfamiliar and the glaring city lights overwhelming after the dim little bar.

"That way," she said at last, pointing vaguely in what she hoped was the direction of Central Park. If she gave him an address, he'd put her in a cab and end the night, and she couldn't bring herself to let him go just yet. His words echoed in her head: _I know when I'm out of my league._ He might not want to see her again.

"That way, huh?" Clint repeated. He threw her a knowing smirk.

"Let's not go home yet," she heard herself say.

Clint had ended up buying her _two_ drinks, and there was a pleasant muffled buzzing in her head. The past few days, the shouting matches and nasty texts, all seemed inconsequential now. It wouldn't last. It would all come back and she'd have to face it, haul herself across town and pack up her stuff, but that was later.

Now she was content with how the world blurred for a moment if she moved too quickly, and the sharp tingly sensation when Clint's fingers brushed against her bare skin. The fact that her brain-to-mouth filter seemed to be disengaged was only amusing and not nearly as mortifying as it should have been.

"We can go…."

 _Fuck_ flashed across her mind and she imagined doing him in the reclining chair in the back of the tattoo parlor, and it was so cliche and ridiculous it almost made her laugh. Almost, but she clamped down on the giggle until it turned into a squeaky hitched cough, lest Clint ask what was funny and make her explain.

"Breakfast?" Clint suggested. "I know a place."

He shucked off his jacket and swung it around her shoulders, a gesture she was familiar with, a gesture she usually detested. His lack of fanfare puzzled her. It was cold and there was nobody around to witness the chivalry, so logically Clint should keep the jacket to himself, or at least play benevolent with a theatrical ' _Sweetheart, you must be freezing!_ ' to earn points from the strangers sharing the sidewalk.

"What?" he asked, and there was something hesitant and doubtful in his tone. She blinked and realized she'd been staring. "You don't have to-"

He reached out to take the jacket back, but she darted out of reach, staggering a little in heels that were suddenly too high.

"You're nice," she told him, and crossed her arms to hug the jacket tighter. She'd been thinking it the entire night, and he seemed to need the extra reassurance. "That's all. I was just thinking, you're nice."

"It's just a jacket," he muttered, but he smiled a little, a soft private expression, and she knew he was pleased.

They started walking, and Clint took her hand. Fingers laced, she noted, because Pepper would ask when she rehashed the date later. They passed a McDonald's and two diners and a hotdog cart, but Clint didn't stop for food. He swung their arms, bumped his shoulder against hers, paused once to press her against a storefront and kiss her.

They walked until her feet hurt. When Clint noticed her lagging behind, he crouched in the middle of the sidewalk and let her loop her arms around his neck, hooked his arms behind her knees, and carried her on his back.

"You're kind of a fraud, right?" she asked, and felt Clint go still.

"What d'you mean?"

"You're a tattoo artist without tattoos," she explained, and rested her head on his shoulder to see his reaction.

"I have tattoos," he said. He rolled his eyes.

But there weren't any on his forearms or biceps, or any peeking out of the collar of his shirt.

"On your ass?" she guessed.

"No, not on my ass," he retorted, and chuckled a little. He glanced at her over his shoulder, as if contemplating how much to tell her. When he spoke again, the words were heavy. "Tattoos are supposed to mean something. I've got a couple, but...well…."

He didn't have enough meaningful things in his life, was that the implication? The way he fell into silence made her chest tighten up, and she cast her mind around for something that would make him smile again.

The street was familiar now, and they passed a long line of people winding around the block until a bright neon sign gleamed at them around the next corner. Kissing in the dark would make Clint smile again, she felt sure. He seemed to enjoy it when they were doing it in the booth in back of the bar.

"Have you ever been?" she asked in his ear.

"What, in there?"

He paused and gave the club a long scrutinizing glance, his mouth turning down at the corners.

"It's fun," she said encouragingly.

"We'll make a deal. If you can get us in without dropping Stark's name, I'll give the place a shot."

"Deal," she agreed. Clint dropped her back on the sidewalk with a bemused expression and trailed dutifully behind as she approached the entrance. He obviously expected her to fail.

"Hi, Robert," she greeted the bouncer, and this time she couldn't stop herself giggling at Clint's scandalized look.

"Natasha," Robert returned, and unhooked the rope to grant them access to the club. A murmur of protests went up from the queue.

"Cheating," Clint accused, and followed her inside. "That guy knew you."

"We come here all the time," she reminded him. She took his hand and laced their fingers, and he smiled again.

The club was loud, as expected, the bass pounding so deep she felt the vibrations through the floor as she walked. They passed from the hallway into the main room of the club, a massive dance floor with bars along each wall and a VIP section on a second floor than spanned half the length of the building. The strobes and flashing neon lights left her dizzy, and she squeezed Clint's hand a little harder.

"Now what?" he asked.

He tugged his hand gently free of hers and pressed it against the small of her back again. There was something solicitous about the gesture this time. He stood just a little closer, so close she could feel the heat off him,

"This time I'm buying you a drink," she said, and nodded in the direction of the closest bar.

She gave her order and the bartender slid back two highball glasses. She passed one to Clint.

"That looks like a bad idea," he said, and eyed his drink dubiously. "What's in it?"

She didn't quite know, because she'd never bothered to ask. The drink carried the same name as the club, and it had been a recommendation from Pepper on her first outing with the group. It was fruity with glittery baking dust mixed in and a glowstick sunk in the bottom, and it packed far less of a punch than the whiskey and soda combo from the dive bar. It was fun and ridiculous and Clint seemed like he could use a little of both.

"Galaxies," she told him, and swirled her glass to make the liquid shimmer. "Stars."

Clint cocked his head and arched a brow.

"I'm not sure we should be drinking stars," he said slowly, but he gave her a wide grin and sampled the drink. "Girly," he assessed, and wrinkled his nose in feigned distaste.

"I bet you do have an ass tattoo," she retorted, and gave his arm a tug.

He let her lead him through the crush of people around the bar and along the perimeter of the dance floor. They sipped their drinks and she badgered him into telling her more about the tattoo parlor, although he evaded and claimed there wasn't much to tell. He talked about Lucky instead.

She tried to avoid the stairs that led up to the VIP level as they circled the room, but security recognized her anyway and loosed the rope strung across the stairs in invitation.

"We can if you want to," Clint said in her ear, his breath hot against her neck. She shivered a little and shook her head. She rested one hand on the back of his neck and stood on tiptoe to return the gesture.

"Just us tonight," she said, and Clint held her a little more firmly. "You dance, right?"

"If you say so," he replied.

She had hoped he'd play along.

"Good. I say so," she asserted, and threw back the rest of her drink. Clint followed suit, they abandoned the empty glasses on a nearby table, then she dragged him out into the middle of the floor.

For all his preference of dive bars and shooting pool, he was exceptional at dancing. His hands drifted and groped in just the right places without being lewd, he masterfully claimed their tiny area of the floor and kept them from slamming into the other couples, and he kept beat with every mix the DJ played.

She lost track of time and the club faded into the background until it was just her and Clint, and his lips kissing trails down her neck, and a dull throbbing ache between her legs.

"Let's go home," she suggested, or tried to, but he sucked at the sensitive spot behind her ear and the words tangled on her tongue until she gave up talking. She worked her hands under his shirt and raked her nails down his back instead, and his fingers dug into her hips hard enough to bruise. He got the message, all right.

They fought their way back toward the entrance, but as they passed the VIP stairs again Natasha paused. Why suffer a long cab ride when there was a discreet corner upstairs literally with her name on it?

"Is Tony still here?" she asked the security guard at the foot of the stairs. Clint gave her arm an insistent tug.

"Missed him by about half an hour, Ms. Romanoff."

 _Perfect!_

"We'll go up anyway, thank you," she said sweetly, and felt Clint press in close as they climbed the stairs.

"You want to... _here_?"

"You can be subtle, can't you?" she shot back with an arch little grin. He gaped and followed her to Tony's VIP lounge, a square arrangement of wide leather sofas, one recessed into the wall just enough to hide any debauchery.

Clint sat and she planted herself on his lap, legs folded on either side of his hips. She leaned down to kiss him, her hair falling in a curtain of red curls to interfere, but Clint only smiled against her lips and used his hands to comb her hair back.

He held one hand against her cheek next, and she let him have the lead. It wasn't the grinding panting makeout session she had originally intended, but the slow, sweet rhythm wasn't entirely unpleasant, either.

Clint paused; she whined in protest and looked over her shoulder for the source of the interruption. A waitress stood beside them, offering a tray with drinks. She didn't want them - she felt a little too numb, a little too disconnected - but Clint plucked one of the cocktails off the tray and nodded his thanks to the waitress.

He scooted forward to set the glass on the table and dipped his fingers in to retrieve the cherry sunk in the bottom. Cliche. And a waste of time.

"Nobody can really do that," she scoffed, and leaned forward to kiss him again. He laid a hand on her shoulder to hold her back.

"Are we making a bet? Because I owe you one for that trick you pulled with the bouncer."

She liked the sound of that. It had been exceptionally fun to one-up him at the pool table and then again outside. She agreed with a nod and a smile.

"If you can do it, you get to-"

"Tattoo a butterfly across your tits?" he interrupted, and she found herself laughing and sticking a hand out for him to shake to seal the bet. "And what do you want if I lose?"

"Another date?" she suggested. There was a hesitancy to the words she hadn't intended, and she ducked her head a little. Clint slid the cherry into his mouth.

"You're already gettin' another date, Nat."

His tone suggested she was ridiculous for ever doubting it, and a new warmth swept through her, different from the single-minded lust that had been motivating her most of the night. Clint made her feel wanted for the right reasons, not just because she was pretty or friends with Tony Stark.

He smiled and there was the cherry stem clenched between his teeth, a knot tied in the middle.

The warmth shifted to the other kind, the kind that pulsed and burned. She didn't care about the bet anymore. No, her mind jumped immediately to how dexterous his tongue must be and whether or not he was the type of guy to go down on a girl.

He waggled his eyebrows and flicked his eyes down briefly to her crotch, and there was her question answered. Fucking perfect Clint Barton, with the biceps and the sleeves rolled up and the stupid smile. His flirting was very calculated, indeed.

"Asshole," she told him.

He rumbled a laugh and laid her down across the leather sofa, back to kissing, only this time he tugged her shirt down a bit and started there, working his way up over her collarbone and around the side of her neck. He wrapped his hands around her arms and guided them up above her head, palms sliding over her skin until he pressed her wrists firmly into the sofa.

"Clint, God," a shameless moan, one step down from pleading.

"Thought we were supposed to be subtle," he murmured.

It suddenly seemed like a shit idea to drag him up to the VIP lounge. He'd managed to beat her at her own game, and whatever he chose to do next, her reaction most definitely wouldn't be subtle.

He slid a hand down the front of her jeans with a wicked, teasing little smirk. His fingers ghosted over her clit and she arched her back and gave up all pretense of self control.

She was wet - how could she not be wet? - but Clint obviously hadn't expected to find her that way. She watched his expression falter in what she took for surprise, just for an instant, before his eyes went a shade darker and the smirk was back. And if she thrust her hips against his hand at that look, just once, well, maybe he hadn't noticed.

"S'go home," he growled, and tugged her to her feet. He'd noticed.

She fell against him and pulled him down for another kiss. She didn't let him go as they tripped down the stairs, or when they paused in the dark hallway near the exit and he pinned her against the wall, and then he eased her back onto more leather, his tongue in her mouth and hands tangled in her hair.

He stopped kissing her to speak, meaningless, muted words not directed at her, and she couldn't bring herself to care. She was only concerned about the fire sparking through her veins and the delicious tension drawing her tighter at each brush of Clint's skin against hers.

She sat up and hooked an arm around his neck, pushed him back against the seat - a cab, they were in a cab, but she didn't worry about an audience - and straddled his lap again. His hands wandered, but never as low as she wanted, and he kept giving her a new nickname each time she rocked forward against his dick. She made a game of it.

"Nat," first.

She rested her forehead against his. His eyes went a little wide.

"Tasha," next.

She liked that one, liked the reverent weight behind his tone.

"Tash," after that.

She arched her back again, curious what he'd come up with now he'd cycled through the obvious variations.

" _Fuck_ , Red, you're killin' me."

He pushed her away, but gently, maneuvering just enough to get her back on the seat beside him. When he kissed her next it was soft and slow.

She trailed her hand down his chest and gripped the front of his jeans, gave the zipper a tug. He moaned into her mouth, then whined, then held her at arm's length.

"We can't," he told her, and shook his head with a pained expression. "God, I'm a fucking idiot, but we're not doing this tonight."

"You're _too_ nice," she mumbled, and leaned forward to kiss him. "You don't have to be nice anymore."

"We're drunk, Tasha," he said through the kiss, but didn't make much effort to pull away again. "I don't want us to be _this_. I don't want to be your rebound, Natasha, I want… _Fuck._ "

"That's the spirit," she said, and swung her leg back over his lap. He laughed, a bitter sound.

"No. Natasha, no." And there was something firm and commanding in his tone that made her slide off his lap and back to her side of the cab. The stationary cab, she noticed; they were parked at the curb in front of a tall red brick apartment building. "I'm taking you home."

"This was your idea," she accused, more than a little stung at his vehement refusal. She couldn't recall ever being turned down before. It made her voice hitch. "Drink and flirt, remember? Why'd you bother coming if you weren't going to follow through?"

"Give me the address, Natasha."

And maybe he had intended to follow through when the night started. Maybe he hadn't cared at first whether or not he was a rebound. She certainly hadn't cared. But the longer she spent with him….

There was something different about Clint, and if she were honest with herself, she didn't want him to be just a rebound anymore, either.

She gave him the address. That didn't mean she was giving up.

"Back to Manhattan?" the cab driver asked, a little surprised. Clint leaned forward to speak with him, and as his attention strayed Natasha seized her chance and slipped out of the cab.

"Yeah, sorry, it's-"

"No problem, buddy. Take care of business in the back of the car, argue all night, whatever. Meter's still running, I don't give a shit."

"Would it still count as a rebound if we did it in the cab?" Natasha called, and sashayed toward the front entrance of Clint's building. She smiled slowly as she heard the car pull away, and when she turned Clint was standing on the sidewalk leering at her.

"You think you're clever," he muttered, drawing even with her, and jammed his key into the lock.


End file.
